Had you even been able to manage a full season before wussing out, we could have excused you, could have believed these ailments were severe enough to sideline you.

(Big Lazy, go ahead and be angry. What have I written since last August, when I first questioned your manhood, that has not been shown to be an entirely accurate assessment?)

A brief history:

Gaither was acquired off waivers on Nov. 30, 2011 and started his first game for the Chargers five days later. As a fill-in, he was absolutely amazing. Honestly, a left tackle could not have played better over five games – let alone for a guy that made those starts without the benefit of training camp or weeks or even a real chance to learn the offense’s intricacies.

Then came free agency. Gaither had not only set himself up well with that divine December audition, but he was set up by being the only starting left tackle on the market.

The Chargers brass held many meetings about giving millions to a player known during his days with the Baltimore Ravens as Big Lazy. The decision makers concluded it could blow up in their faces but that they had no choice to sign him, and they gave him a four-year, $24.5 million contract that paid Gaither $9 million (guaranteed) in the first year.

Gaither left the first practice of training camp with cramps. No, really.

He braved an entire practice the next day.

The following day, midway through the first practice in pads, he went down with “back spasms” and did not practice again until Sept. 26.

Talk began inside Chargers Park a few weeks after he left that first padded practice that Gaither maybe wasn’t trying hard enough to get back on the field. By the season opener, there was word from several sources inside the building that the Chargers medical staff doubted the severity of Gaither’s injury. There was implication from reliable sources that Gaither had shown to not be able to tolerate pain that a much smaller person -- perhaps one with ovaries -- would routinely abide.

(The reference to a woman’s pain tolerance was not meant as a slight by the people who said it, nor is it meant as such by me. We all know who’s bearing children and that the population would be much lower if men possessed birth canals. The comparison had to do with how a much smaller human, less accustomed to dealing with the bumps and bruises of football, might react to the same thing incapacitating Gaither.)

Gaither finally played Sept. 30 at Kansas City, performing pretty well for most of four quarters. He injured his groin the next week at New Orleans, missed a game, returned for two more games and was essentially finished Nov. 7 when he simply could not finish practice. The Chargers placed him on injured reserve on Nov. 23.

I guaranteed late in the season that he would never again play for the Chargers. I reiterated that promise even after Mike McCoy and Tom Telesco said everyone gets a fresh start.

Dean Spanos was never going to allow it. Teammates were not going to tolerate it. Both believe Gaither stole from them.

Professional athletes are like a wolf pack, they stick together publicly, even when they don’t like a teammate privately. In almost two decades, I have never seen anything like the disgust Chargers players expressed regarding Gaither.

Now, blaming Gaither is easy, and responsibility ultimately lies at his feet.

But to solely blame him would be to impugn incompletely.

Someone gave Gaither this contract that in Chargers history is surpassed in its failure only by the 1998 drafting of Ryan Leaf.

Gaither’s lasting effect in San Diego has become a part of A.J. Smith’s legacy. Signing Gaither to that contract joins the handling of Vincent Jackson and drafting of Larry English – and awaits the possible inductions of the Ryan Mathews and Robert Meachem moves -- in the A.J. Hall of Blame.

What Smith did in the 2012 offseason was akin to a person with a nut allergy feeling they were about to starve and gobbling down a bowl full of pistachios. His bad drafts were like Smith coming in contact with peanuts, but it was Gaither, et al, and Gaither most of all, that ultimately secured Smith’s demise.

What a disaster. At the worst possible position.

Over the past three years, the Chargers have paid a combined $21.6 million to Marcus McNeill and Gaither – to start a total of 29 games (of 48) at left tackle. (McNeill had to retire after 2011 due a chronic neck condition he had repeatedly tried to play through.)

Just five other teams paid more for their left tackle from 2010-12. All but one of those higher-priced players started more games than the McNeill-Gaither tandem. Four of those five left tackles made multiple Pro Bowls from '10-12. Three were named first-team All-Pro at least once.

Some people have taken to blaming Chargers vice president Ed McGuire for this contract. He is the guy who negotiates all deals for the team.

But McGuire does what he’s told in these instances. He was told to get a deal done.

As much as anything, Gaither is a poster child for what can happen when a team gets desperate in free agency.

They didn’t ignore the warning signs that were there due to the fact the Ravens let Gaither go for essentially the same act. What the Chargers did was blow through the warning signs.

There is plenty of blame to go around, mainly to cast upon Gaither.

Just because the Chargers wore a sign saying “rob us” doesn’t mean he had to do it.